VALENCIA. A Mediterranean seaport of Spain, capital of the Province of Valencia, 185 miles east-southeast of Madrid, on the right bank of the Guadalaviar. two and a half miles from its mouth (Map; Spain. E 3). As the former cap ital of the Kingdom of Valencia it retains many traces of Moorish occupancy. The surrounding !tuella resembles a vast shady orchard and bears magnificent groves of citron, orange, and mul berry. The city itself is picturesque in the crowded, narrow, and winding streets of the older portion and charming in the broader streets and luxuriant piovis and pascOs of the newer part. Its climate is mild and very dry. The public buildings are numerous and interest ing architeettH•ally and because of their historical significance. Among the important churches the Cathedral La Seo occupies first place. This struc ture was begun in and completed in 1482. The Church of San Andrtis contains some beau tiful frescoes and paintings of Juanes, It ibalta, and \'ergat•a. The former• Convento del Cgrinen is now utilized for the Provineial Museum of Paintings, with a very complete collection rep resenting the Valencian school and some notable foreign works. La Lonja (the silk exchange), the centre of the commercial life of the city, is a beautiful Gothic structure, built on the site of the Moorish A1eairsan•. The Aduana, a superb structure erected for a custom house by Charles IV., is now occupied as a tobaeco factory, em ploying 4000 operatives. The provincial hospi tal, housed in a fifteenth-century structure. ac commodates 6000 patients annually. The orna mental Plaza de Toros. or bull ring, reputed the best in Spain. seats 17.000 spectators. The Plaza del Mercado is the largest of the public squares of the city; others of note are the Plaza del Principe Alfonso, the Plaza de Tettnin, the site of the old Citadel, and the Plaza de la Rehm. a busy shopping and caf6 centre. Modern improve
ments include the introduction of tramways. of gas and electricity, an adequate water supply, and a sewerage system. The harbor of Valencia is one of the most secure on the Mediterranean coast. The chief exports are rice. inching, oranges, and other fruits, green and dried, wines. silks, raw and spun, and an excellent quality of olive oil. In 1898 more than 1200 vessels entered and cleared. The industries of the city include to bacco manufacturing, silk spinning, and hemp and linen weaving. There are also manufactures of velvet, hat plush, felt, gloves, fans (a special product), iron and bronze ware, leather goods, and pottery ware, especially the mosaic bricks known as azulejos, for which there are more than twenty establishments in the environs of the city. The agricultural industries of the vicinity are also important. Valencia is the seat of one of the foremost universities of Spain. (See VALENCIA. UNIVERSITY OF.) The population. illustrating in character and physical traits the early Moorish admixture, numbered, in 1900, 215.4187. Valencia first appears in history in B.C. 138, when it was given the Jus Latinum. It was destroyed by Pompey. captured by the Visigoths in 413, and by the Moors in 714. In 1021 it became the capital of an independent Moorish kingdom. In 1095 it was captured by the Cid, but the Moors subsequently assumed con trol. until its final capture by .James I. of Aragon in 1238. The expulsion of the Moriseoes at the beginning of the seventeenth century greatly crippled its prosperity, and by espousing the Austrian side during the War of Spanish Suc cession, it lost many of its ancient privileges. In 1812 it was captured by Suchet and remained in the possession of the French until the follow ing year.